Any American city of 50,000 inhabitants may be taken as illustrative of all American industrial communities. In such a city, the economical and political conditions are typical. The immediate commercial interests of the buyers of labor, the employers, are opposed to those of the sellers of labor, the employed. To control the price of labor, each of these parties in the labor market resorts to whatever measures it finds within command. The employers in many branches of industry actually, and employers in general tacitly, combine against the labor organizations. On the wage-workers' side, these organizations are the sole means, except a few well-nigh futile laws, yet developed to raise wages and shorten the work day. In case of a strike, the employers, to assist the police in intimidating the strikers, may engage a force of armed so-called detectives. Simply, perhaps, for inviting non-unionists to cease work, the strikers are subject to imprisonment. Trial for conspiracy may follow arrest, the judges allied by class interests with the employers. The newspapers, careful not to offend advertisers, and looking to the well-to-do for the mass of their readers, may be inclined to exert an influence against the strikers. The solidarity of the wage-workers incomplete, even many of these may regard the fate of the strikers with indifference. In such situation, a strike of the wage-workers may be made to appear to all except those closely concerned as an assault on the bulwarks of society. But what are the bulwarks of society directly arrayed against striking wage-workers? They are a ring of employers, a ring of officials enforcing class law made by compliant representatives at the bidding of shrewd employers, and a ring of public sentiment makers--largely professional men whose hopes lie with wealthy patrons. Behind these outer barriers, and seldom affected by even widespread strikes, lies the citadel in which dwell the monopolists.